Genesis 10:1

This is the account of Shem, Ham and Japheth, Noah’s sons, who themselves had sons after the flood.

From there, Genesis goes into a long genealogy. From time to time, it pauses to say something about a particular individual. Many of us wonder why the Bible includes so many genealogies. In some situations when the Bible is presented to a particular people group, the genealogies give it credibility to the new audience. Would these genealogies be useful in reaching a people group like the Soses who give them high value?

Pray that today’s missionaries will not neglect the use of genealogies when they are useful.

Sose Malinke People of Gambia

by GEC

Father and son play the balaphons (similar to xylophones) while a younger son keeps rhythm on a tall drum. Two beautiful daughters join them in their shady spot and begin to move in a graceful, floating dance over the packed earth. The Sose family has taken off work early today because they heard that the griot, a local story teller of family histories, would join them soon.
The rhythm of the balaphons and the drum grows faster. Then it stops. The griot approaches with his assistant. Griots have learned Malinke history in exacting form and can recite it going back hundreds of years. The griot sits on a low stool to recite the history of this Sose family. His aid begins plucking a high-pitched stringed instrument called the jali. The griot quotes a name from the previous generation. Pause. He tells something about that person. Pause. He names the father of the previous person. Pause. He tells something about him. And on he goes, generation after generation. All the while the assistant plucks the jali.
Like other Malinke peoples, the Soses are an oral society. Some can read, but what really matters to them is remembered and publically recited. Those who would bring the gospel to the Soses must find oral methods to do so.

Pray for creative oral communicators who can share the story of Isa, Jesus, with the Sose Malinkes. Pray that soon the Sose people will be using their musical and story telling skills to spread the word about Jesus far and wide.